Trump urges Senate GOP to end filibuster for future votes

[DonViejo]

Source: The Hill



BY MAX GREENWOOD - 07/28/17 10:24 AM EDT

President Trump called on the Senate Friday to change its rules to require a 51-vote majority to pass individual bills without risking a Democratic filibuster.

"If Republicans are going to pass great future legislation in the Senate, they must immediately go to a 51 vote majority, not senseless 60," he wrote on Twitter. "Even though parts of healthcare could pass at 51, some really good things need 60. So many great future bills & budgets need 60 votes."

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

Trump's tweets came hours after the Senate narrowly rejected a scaled-back ObamaCare repeal bill, effectively derailing Republicans' current efforts to repeal parts of the healtlhcare law.

Doing away with the filibuster would not have ensured the so-called "skinny" repeal bill's success, a fact that Trump appeared to acknowledge in his tweets. The measure needed only 51 votes to pass, and three Republicans — Sens. John McCain (Ariz.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Susan Collins (Maine) — voted against it.

Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/344294-trump-urges-senate-gop-to-end-filibuster-for-future-votes

[marylandblue]

1. McConnell isn't ending the filibuster

He is too good at using it to his advantage.

[regnaD kciN]

4. More to the point...

...someday, inevitably, Democrats will regain control of Congress and the White House. Abolishing the filibuster would give Dems carte blanche to ram through all sorts of legislation that would be anathema to Republicans (from single-payer to increasing the size of SCOTUS and then packing the court with liberal justices) with merely 50 members.

[broadcaster90210]

12. This.

nt

[Renew Deal]

18. It seems like the point of congress is to accomplish nothing

Because you can never get 60% to agree on almost anything other than defense

[karynnj]

19. We passed ACA with 60 votes.

In addition, we passed the stimulus, which was critical to the country moving forward in 2009, with 60 votes. We ratified the Start treaty with 67 votes. We passed a few jobs bills with 60 votes. We passed the Veterans bill (Sanders/MCCain) with over 60 votes. Many small business bills were passed with over 60 votes. (In the Bush years, the committee ran so bipartisanly that Kerry and Snowe were caught on a open mike in 2007 or 2008, comparing their prepared questions before the second panel and laughing because they were essentially the same, leading them to quickly divide them between themselves - with both of them laughing about how bipartisan their committee was.)

The idea was not that nothing could happen, but that it would be a high enough bar that things did NOT swing back and forth as administrations changed. In fact, McConnell and his peers led to a sea change when they enforced a party line rule on voting yes for ACA. The saddest vote was that after voting for the bill in the Finance committee, saying she did not want to be on the wrong side of histroy, Olymphia Snowe voted against the bill on the Senate floor. Not to mention, the bill was not far from bills she supported for decades - as did a few other Democrats.

Rather than implicitly support a lower threshold, the call should be for the Republicans to actually allow their members to work with Democrats. (That goes for throwng the Hastert rule in the garbage - as discredited as its namesake.) I am not being partisan when I blame the Republicans alone. I can cite many Democratic lead efforts that went out of their way to include Republicans that were done when we had 59 Senators. In fact, when we had 60, Baucus worked for 4 months with the gang of 6 - including 3 Republcians. Had he NOT done this, it is possible that the ACA could have passed earlier, with enough time to even pass a conference bill in both houses. This complete passage might even have changed things enough that Scott Brown, elected to stop Obamacare, might have lost. This would have led to a full year more of the Democrats having 60 Senators. (compared to only 4 months, it would have been a year and 4 months.)

[WinstonSmith4740]

20. I tend to agree.

However, you can't put it passed these bastards to pass a bill that will benefit them, and only them. They could write a bill to end the filibuster, but have it "sunset" in 2020, so in case they lose control of everything ( ), they would again be able to filibuster at will. That way Democrats wouldn't be able to use their own tactics against them. They hate that.

[harun]

2. No one loves the filibuster more than the GOP. It is going nowhere.

[Eyeball_Kid]

3. Trumpy to Senate:

Dismantle your traditions for ME.

Senate to Trumpy: Amuse yourself with a corn cob.

[MontanaMama]

5. "Amuse yourself with a corn cob."

You don't know how badly I needed that laugh this morning!

[iluvtennis]

10. Agree, love that comment also, I'll have to leverage it in the future.

[Achilleaze]

6. KING CASINO, the republican Draft-Dodger-in-Chief

issues another half-assed royal decree, as if he makes all the rules. Freaking submissive republicans might like having a FAKE republican KING in the White House. But decent, honest Americans do not go for that shit. We are totally into democracy.

Investigate, prosecute, and punish republican-russian TreasonWeasels.

[Jim__]

7. Even when there is no filibuster - 49 votes will lose.

[C_U_L8R]

8. Trump don't know squat

That's not how it works, dummy. What an assclown.

[onenote]

9. what one stands on the filibuster tends to vary depending on where you sit

There were plenty of people here at DU that were angry that Reid didn't get rid of the filibuster when the Democrats controlled the Senate. And if the Democrats regain the Senate in 2018, I suspect we'll see more of the same.

The filibuster can be a pain in the ass. But in the long run, it's a necessary pain in the ass.

[David__77]

11. I think Democrats should get rid of it when they get the chance.

Absolutely so.

Once there's a majority, we should pass laws that will create as irreversible of a progressive transformation as possible. And if the Republicans get rid of it, the Democrats should not restore it once in power.

[WinstonSmith4740]

21. We need to keep it.

But bring it back to its former glory. You want to filibuster? Fine, get your ass down on the floor of the Senate and go full "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". All a filibuster is these days is a demand for 60 votes, because they're lazier than shit. If those crusty old bastards had to hold the floor for more than 30 minutes, their bladders would probably explode.

Democracy is messy, dirty, and frustratingly slow. It takes compromise and cooperation. And that's the way it was designed, and should be. All majorities, even the ones we like and support, can become drunk with power and over reach, although the Republicans tend to do that more. What we are presently experiencing is proof. Democrats tend to shoot themselves in the foot trying to please everyone, but at least they try to help as many as possible. Personally, I think they need to hire a good marketing person. They don't seem to have any idea as to how to market their own success. If they hadn't run away from Obamacare, the outcome of the 2010 election may have been very different. I mean, look at what we're seeing now. People are in the streets, in town hall meetings, writing letters, making phone calls...just getting involved, to save the ACA. It's the same damn bill they passed, and lost the 2010 elections on, but now people love it because it's proven itself, and they understand its benefits.

So, yeah, we're being forced to watch sausage being made here. But it's all part of the process. The Arc of Justice and all that.

[Wounded Bear]

13. Perhaps they should propose some better legislation instead...

[beachbum bob]

14. Not gonna happen and why bipartisanship must take over

[C Moon]

15. If possible, they'll get rid of it temporarily. Ram through some anti-American bull shit;

let some billionaires get richer; then put it back in place for when they are no longer in power.

[VaBchTgerLily]

16. WTF is he saying? isn't that contradicting?

first he says 51 then he says 60????
I don't think he knows what he means

[Renew Deal]

17. Universal Healthcare here we come

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

22. Hey Trump

Go Cheney yourself

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

23. I would rather Trump advocate for having the presidency awarded by popular vote

Of course, he had already covered that possibility during the 2016 campaign by claiming over and over again that the election was rigged.

And we know what his current attitude about the actual popular vote is -- if you don't count everyone who didn't vote for him, Trump won the popular vote bigly.